The installation was smooth, painless, trouble-free, and surprisingly
fast. DrakX, the graphical installer, makes a great first impression,
as any installer should. The installation process consists of the
usual screens:

Device detection

Language selection

License acceptance

Security model selection

Disk partitioning

Package group selection and customization

Package installation

Post-installation configuration and fine-tuning

Update installation (optional)

Reboot to newly-installed system

A number of features from the installation process really stood out
and deserve specific mention. The Help button was present on almost
all of the DrakX screens, and the help text was genuinely helpful,
uniformly concise, and refreshingly jargon-free. For example, on the
Security model selection screen, I encountered a text box asking for
the Security Administrator's login name or email address. Unsure what
precisely DrakX wanted, I clicked the Help button, scrolled to the
bottom, and learned that the "Security Administrator" is whatever
account, person, or email address you want to receive security reports
from Mandrakelinux's nightly security audits.

The package group selection screen boasted a richer set of options
than I anticipated. Rather than merely selecting a workstation or
server installation, you can select the *type* of workstation or server
you want to install, and you can mix and match between server- and
workstation-class packages groups.

On the workstation side, for example, DrakX offers the following
options:

Additional package groups not associated with either workstation or
server installations enable you to add development tools, libraries,
and headers; the standard deluge of HOWTOs and FAQs; the desktop GUI
of your choice--KDE 3.2, GNOME 2.4, and other (IceWM, WindowMaker,
Enlightenment, FVWM, and more); and, interestingly, third-party
programs that provide LSB compliance.

In the end, I chose to install everything but the server packages. On
the desktop, I opted for KDE 3.2. The total package count came to 1,423
packages, requiring 1.1GB disk space. Installing all of these packages
took less than 15 minutes. Yes, you read that right, 15 minutes to
install over 1,400 packages weighing in at more than 1GB of disk
space! How's that for fast? An equivalent installation of Red Hat, er,
Fedora requires something on the order of 45 minutes to one hour.

After everything is installed, DrakX gives you a chance to complete
system configuration tasks before you boot the new system. Steps you
complete here include setting the root user's password and adding
mortal user. This is standard fare, but has the added twist of
permitting you to create the root account sans password and to login
the added user automatically--I strongly recommend against both
practices for hopefully self-evident security reasons.

After completing the minimal post-installation configuration, I booted
the newly-installed system.